How to Study with CASE STUDIES in Nursing School
A nursing student explains how to tackle case-study exam questions using a nine-question critical-thinking framework that covers assessment, lab values, comorbidities, physician orders, and nursing interventions. She maps this approach to the nursing process and teaches prioritization using ABCs and Maslow's hierarchy, with patient safety as the final decision-maker.
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In this video, we are diving into how to study using case studies. Instructors love to use case studies in Nursing school. They also show up a lot on your nursing school exams where they'll give you a case scenario question and you'll have to choose the best answer based on the info that they give you. But they can be super tricky to figure out sometimes. So I'm going to give you the best strategies to help you rock your case studies in nursing school. So hit that subscribe button and click the notification bell and dive in. So the first thing you need to know about Case Studies in Nursing School is that they're meant to test your critical thinking. But don't freak out. Critical thinking is a lot easier than you're thinking right now. There's only two parts to it. Planning ahead and connecting the dots. That's it. If you want a deep dive into those two things, be sure to check this video out. Now. I have a list of critical thinking questions that will really help as you're working on answering answering your case study questions in nursing school. They will help you get into the mindset of figuring out what's going on with the patient and then what you need to do about it. I'll go through them with you here, but don't worry. I've also listed them out on a free cheat sheet for you that you can print off and use as you work on your homework and case studies in nursing school. Now the link is in the description below for you to download it. So so these critical thinking questions are what do I need to assess and look for with this disorder, which includes lab values and signs and symptoms? How does this disorder impact a patient without comorbidities, meaning that this is the only health concern disorder or disease that they have. How does this disorder impact a patient with comorbidities, which means that they have another health concern disease or disorder? At the same time? What interventions are most likely to be ordered by the doctor? What would you expect to see ordered for this patient, including medications and lab draws? What interventions are within my scope of practice as a nurse to do without an order? So what can you do as the nurse to help this patient get better? Things like position changes and patient education, Things like that. How do these interventions impact a patient without comorbidities? So how would that medication or position change or other intervention impact the patient and their condition? How do these interventions impact a patient with comorbidity? So ask yourself how that medication or position change or intervention impacts the other illnesses the patient has now, what patient and family education needs to occur. And finally, ask yourself what other disorders or problems are commonly associated with this disorder. These critical thinking questions will help guide your critical thinking as you go through your case studies. So be thinking about each of these questions as you answer your case study questions in nursing school. So now that you've elevated your critical thinking skills by using these nine key critical thinking questions, the next step is to answer your case study questions correctly. Of course, we want to get them all correct, right? So there are two things that you should focus your attention on. Walking through the nursing process and prioritizing patient needs. Let's start with the nursing process and how to apply it to a case study question. Oftentimes, your case studies will ask you a series of questions like what would you do to help the patient improve? Or what would you look for and assess with a particular patient? These are all questions that relate to the nursing process, assessment, diagnosis, planning, implementation, and evaluation. They'll ask you what you should look for, meaning the nursing assessment. They'll ask you what you should do about it, meaning what interventions and implementations should be done, or maybe what nursing does diagnosis or patient goals you would make for that patient. The nursing process is everything in nursing school. You are walking through it all the time and answering case study questions is no different. Even though the questions may use different language like what would you look for? Or what's the best course of action? You should always be thinking about how it fits into the nursing process and that will make it a whole lot simpler for you. Now, if you want a deep dive into the nursing process, be sure to check this video out right here. Now, another huge thing you should focus on is prioritizing patient needs. And there's two ways that we'll do that that we'll talk about here. But before we get to that, I want to give a shout out to our YouTube comment of the Week from Nurse Z, which says this video came right on time. I start my third semester today. Woohoo. Thanks hun. Super helpful. Yay. Congratulations on starting your third semester. Thank you. That's super exciting. I hope it goes super well for you. And thanks so much for all of your sweet comments and your constant support. I feel so blessed that you're here right now that I get super pumped each week to help you through nursing school. So keep your comments coming, friend. All right, so the two big strategies you should use to prioritize patient care and answer your case scenario questions correctly are the ABC's and Maslow's hierarchy of needs. Now I'M going to walk you through how to use these two strategies to answer case scenario questions. Right? But if you're a nursing SOS member, be sure to log into your dashboard and check out the Fundamentals course where we have a whole video training for you on patient prioritization. I also walk you through some practice case scenario questions in there as well, which will help it all really click and come together for you. So be sure to check that out. So ABC stands for Error, Breathing and Circulation. These are your top three priorities when doing patient care and when you're answering case scenario questions, you need to make sure your patient has a clear airway, you need to make sure that they are breathing adequately, and you need to make sure that their blood is flowing and circulating. If one of these isn't happening, it's game over, right? So that's why the ABCs should be your top priority. So oftentimes when you're faced with a case scenario question, it might ask you what your priority nursing action would be or what your initial or immediate action would be. When you see this on your exams, the first thing you should think about is the ABCs. Look at each answer to the question and ask yourself if any of them refer to the ABCs. Anything that keeps the patient's airway clear, keeps them breathing or keeps their blood circulating. So if you identify an answer like that, go back, reread the question and make sure that that answer makes sense. And if it does, perfect. That's the answer that I would choose. If you want a deep dive into the ABCs for nursing school and how to prioritize patient care, watch this video right here for a deep dive on that. The same thing goes for Maslow's hierarchy of needs. Here is Maslow's hierarchy of needs in order of priority. Physiological needs, safety and security needs, love and belonging, self esteem and self actualization. It makes it really easy to follow because they're already listed in order of priority. This hierarchy means that you will need to solve a patient's physiological needs first before you go on and focus on the other needs like love and belonging and their self esteem needs. Physiological needs includes things like making sure that they can breathe and that their blood is circulating properly. Safety and security needs includes things like making sure that their IV tubing is out of the way, that they can't trip on it, and making sure that their bed is in the lowest position and that they have their call light with them. Now this also refers to things like being financially secure and having secure relationships. Those are all safety and security things Love and belonging Needs refer to the patient's connectedness with others and if they feel like they have people who care about them. The self esteem tier is the need to have confidence in themselves and their abilities that they believe in themselves and have a sense of accomplishment. And self actualization means that they are achieving their full potential and striving to always become better. Looking at this hierarchy, it makes sense how they are prioritized because if a patient can't breathe, which is a physiological problem, we want to fix that problem first before we help them with feeling loved and connected with people. So as you're answering your case scenario questions, figure out how Maslow's hierarchy of needs fits into it. Where's the patient in this hierarchy and how can you help them move up the hierarchy? We also have a deep dive on Maslow's hierarchy of needs, so if you want more info on it, check this video out. These are all the critical thinking aspects that your nursing instructors are testing you on when they give you a case scenario question. They're looking at how you take all the information they give you and draw conclusions and make decisions with it. Now, the biggest key to remember when answering case scenario questions is patient safety. Patient safety is always your number one priority, so if there is something that you can do to keep the patient safer, that's most likely the answer your instructors are looking for. In a few weeks, I am going to be releasing a video all about why Med Surg is so hard. I know case scenario questions play into that, but there's a lot of other factors too. We'll talk about why it's hard and I'll give you my best tips to overcome it and rock med Surg even though it's super tough. So don't forget to hit that notification bell to get notified when that video is available. It's one you don't want to miss. Now make sure to like comment, subscribe and share this video with a friend. And click on one of these videos right over here so you can keep rocking nursing school and friend. Go become the nurse that God created only you to be and I will see you in the next video.
